Common name
Erect Kerosine Grass
Large Silver Grass
White Grass
Kerosine Grass
Tall Kerosine Grass

Derivation
Aristida L., Sp. Pl. 1: 82 (1753); from the Latin arista (an awn).

holathera- from the Greek holos (wholly) and ather (spike or ear of wheat). Awn not disarticulating from the base of lemma at maturity.

Common synonyms
Aristida browniana Henrard
Aristida browniana Henrard var. browniana
Aristida browniana Henrard var. latifolia B.K.Simon
Aristida stipoides R.Br.
Aristida stipoides var. brachyathera Domin
Aristida muelleri Henrard

Habit
Annual or perennial, tufted. Culms 28–128 cm tall, 2–5-noded. Mid-culm internodes mid-green or glaucous, smooth or scaberulous, glabrous. Lateral branches simple or sparsely branched or branched. Leaf-sheaths smooth or scaberulous, glabrous on surface. Ligule a fringe of hairs, 0.3–0.5 mm long. Collar glabrous or pubescent. Leaf-blades straight or flexuous, filiform or linear, flat or conduplicate or involute or convolute, 10–25 cm long, 2–4 mm wide. Leaf-blade venation comprising 0–5 vascular bundles. Leaf-blade surface glabrous.

Inflorescence
Inflorescence compound, a panicle. Panicle open, elliptic, 8–41 cm long, 1–10 cm wide. Primary panicle branches appressed, moderately spaced, 2-nate, 2 cm long.

Spikelets
pikelets solitary. Fertile spikelets 1-flowered, comprising 1 fertile floret, without rhachilla extension, lanceolate, terete, 12–25 mm long, breaking up at maturity. Spikelets disarticulating below each fertile floret. Floret callus elongated, 1.8–3 mm long, pubescent, pungent.

Glumes
Glumes persistent, similar, thinner than fertile lemma. Lower glume lanceolate, 7–16 mm long, 60–70% length of upper glume, membranous, 1-keeled, 1–3-nerved. Lower glume lateral nerves absent or obscure. Lower glume surface glabrous. Lower glume apex emarginate or acute or acuminate. Upper glume lanceolate, 12–25 mm long, 15–20% of length of adjacent fertile lemma, membranous, 1-keeled, 1-nerved. Upper glume lateral nerves absent. Upper glume surface smooth or asperulous, glabrous. Upper glume apex emarginate or acute or acuminate or cuspidate, mucronate.

Florets
Fertile lemma lanceolate, subterete, 8–13.5 mm long, coriaceous, pallid and light brown, mottled with last colour, 3-nerved. Lemma surface smooth or scaberulous or papillose or punctate or muricate, rough above. Lemma margins convolute, covering most of palea, without distinctive roughness. Lemma apex acute, 3-awned. Median (principal) awn 3-branched, 52–135 mm long overall, 34–78 mm long, with a twisted column, deciduous, abscissing from top of lemma. Column 18–57 mm long. Lateral lemma awns present, 27–66 mm long, subequal to principal, 90–95% of length of principal. Palea 20% of length of lemma, without keels. Anthers 3. Grain with adherent pericarp, terete, not grooved, 4.8–7.9 mm long. Hilum linear, 30–40% of length of caryopsis.

Continental Distribution:
Tropical Asia, Australasia.

Australian Distribution:
Western Australia, Northern Territory, South Australia, Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria.

Western Australia: Gardner, Fitzgerald, Hall, Dampier, Mueller, Canning, Carnegie, Giles, Helms, Fortescue, Ashburton, Carnarvon, Austin, Irwin, Drummond, Avon, Coolgardie. Northern Territory: Darwin & Gulf, Victoria River, Barkly Tableland, Central Australia North, Central Australia South. South Australia: North-western, Lake Eyre, Nullabor, Gairdner-Torrens Basin, Flinders Ranges, Eastern, Northern Lofty, Murray, Yorke Peninsula, Southern Lofty. Queensland: Cook, Burke, North Kennedy, South Kennedy, Port Curtis, Leichhardt, Burnett, Wide Bay, Darling Downs, Moreton, Gregory North, Gregory South, Mitchell, Warrego, Maranoa. New South Wales: North-Western Slopes, North-Western Plains, South-Western Plains, North Far Western Plains, South Far Western Plains. Victoria: Murray Mallee.

Classification. (GPWG 2001):
Aristidoideae

Notes
Native. Aristida holathera is a widely distributed species that varies from a weak perennial or annual arid form (to which the name Aristida muelleri has been applied) to a stronger wet-area tropical perennial with its broad leaved form var. latifolia. It intergrades almost imperceptably into A. contorta at the arid end of its range, differing only in its longer lemma which is purplish at maturity. The name A. holathera used to apply only to a form in which the lemma column was described as having a weak articulation and the awns were reported as being shorter, with the name A. browniana being used for the more commonly occurring form with a distinct lemma articulation and longer awns, but these differences were shown not to hold up on close inspection (Simon 1986).

Aristida holathera var. holathera
Callitris, Eucalyptus, mulga (Acacia aneura) and Melaleuca communities on sands, loams and alluvial soils. Flowering and fruiting all year.

Aristida holathera var. latifolia
A few scattered records from tropical Western Australia and the Northern Territory. Rock and sandy soils. Flowering and fruiting April, June to August.
This variety differs from the type variety by having leaf blades which are more than 3 mm wide and are flattened.

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